Unless You Have A Website, You’re Not in Business

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Do you remember life before cellular phones? How did we ever do anything? We live in a time when technology makes life easier (and sometimes more complex) to the point that doing most things without the aid of technology seems preposterous. While mobile phones have warped everyday life over the past few decades, business websites have revolutionized our approaches to business models, advertising, and reaching our target market.

The Importance of Having a Company Website

(In Addition to Social Media)

You might be surprised how many companies have yet to grasp the importance of having an adequate website. Actually, it’s hard to imagine a business that wouldn’t benefit from having one. A website serves as the main hub of a company’s digital presence, and it’s the most direct way to find a company on the Internet. There are still holdovers who prefer the phone book, but their numbers are dwindling. When someone wants to find something, anything, they search for it online.

The principles are more or less the same as they’ve always been. If you sell cars, you want people to come to your lot when they need a vehicle. Twenty years ago, people may have walked their fingers up and down the pages of the phone book looking for an address or a phone number to call, but today, phone books may as well be stone tablets. Consumers maybe kept an eye and an ear out for TV and radio spots in the past. Unfortunately for the old guard, the major forms of traditional advertising (print, radio and even TV) are beginning to get drowned out by customers who don’t have the patience for ads.

Showing up in Internet search results lends instant legitimacy to your business. Having a web presence shows that you value your credibility and it represents a willingness to meet your customers where they live. Ideally, this means combining a company website with a social media presence.

It is proactive to have active social media accounts for your business, but it’s important to remember that social media does not serve the same purpose as a website. After all, not everyone with a computer uses social media. Social media profiles are not generally tailored to best meet all of your web needs. Social media grows more important with each passing day, but is best used as an extension of your website. The website is your hub, and must always take precedent.

Modern websites are incredibly versatile and can capture the essence of your brand better than traditional advertising can. Even if you’re a small start-up, your website can give you the presence of a polished and well-established company. Sure, larger companies with higher marketing budgets can flood the web with more content, but you might be surprised by how robust a website can look and feel with just a minimal amount of content.

For companies looking to get on the map with their first website, or looking to update an aging one, the best way to get started is to reach out to a professional. We (Jemully Media) work with clients in all stages of the business cycle, and all budget ranges; we understand a tight budget. But trust me, you don’t want to sacrifice quality on your website. Your company website is, after all, your first impression to a potential customer.

“[…] it only takes 50 milliseconds for a customer to form an opinion about your website,” (Mia Steinberg, Checkfront).

Even if your content is on an outdated company website, you may not be keeping customers on the page long enough to find it. If you haven’t wondered this already, getting into the web game will make you question how you ever did business before.